The Blonde Collective

From: Michelle Merriweather Photography

In an interview conducted with Blonde Collective owner, Brad Hicks:

History
The idea for The Blonde Collective was conceived in September of 2009, while I was working for the Ann Arbor record label Ghostly International. After working with them for about a year and a half, I had this creative bug to get out and create my own company (it’s easy to get inspired when working with other creatives non-stop). I had a few meetings with Sam Valenti IV (the owner of Ghostly) about it and he seemed to really believe in my new creative endeavor. I parted ways with Ghostly in October and set out to open up Blonde, but I wanted to make sure that I had my mind right about what I wanted to sell.I knew that I didn’t have a lot of start-up money and I knew that I wanted to stay true to my believes in what the brand should be. I grew up in the 90’s. Back then, kids wore Ocean Pacific, Cross-Colors and Junco; everyone was a skateboarder; you’d find Veruca Salt and De La Soul on the same mixtape (they were actually tapes back then too) and I had a MAD crush on Cree Summer (“Freddie” from A Different World). It was a time when everyone began to understand everyone else, and I found that exciting. It was with all of these things in mind that made me launch Blonde with a mission to not cater to one specific “type” of customer, but to make our fashions accessible to everyone. With the over-saturation of loud shirts with neon colors and busy graphics, I wanted to set the trend by making the art on our shirts simple, clean and palatable to all who would see it. I wanted to print on unisex tees so everyone would be comfy in them, and if the ladies like a tee and want to cut it up into a tank top, I support it. ”Fashion forward for everyone” became our motto.Once all that was out of the way, it was just deciding which five shirt designs would become our inaugural line, getting them out to the printers (shout to VG Kids, our printers– they are awesome) and opening the store. The Blonde Collective opened at (a little after) Noon on October 22, 2009. Now is the most exciting time for me because (not even being three months old) the brand itself is in the same place that the clothing is. It is in that molding, baby stage where we can do anything want and take big chances with the goal of finding out who we are to become.

What type of items do the store sell?
Right now the Blonde webstore only sells t-shirts, but we are looking to expand the line into 2010 and we’ll hopefully have hats along with some cut and sew items (button downs, etc), women’s tees and accessories by the end of this year.

Name brands,labels etc. within the store?
Blonde is its own brand so the store carries only Blonde merchandise. This is something that we have been in discussions with others about, and you might start to see some offerings from other designers and brands as well as the year goes by.

Future collaborations of the store?
I worked really hard at the end of 2009 to try and make as many connections as possible so that when 2010 jumped off we would be fired up and have reason for our customers to be fired up. I think it is going to be a great year for collabs. On the streetwear/boutique tip, I’m in talks right now for a possible collab (that is really exciting) with the guys at Revive in Birmingham. In the world of art, we have been talking to a great visual artist (or Vj) in Chicago for a possible video/T-shirt collab. Currently, we have a free shirt give-a-way going on with the fashion site ATshirtBlog.com (that runs until the 27th, if you want to get in on that), and I am in collab mode with a great indie dance label in the Detroit area, Blank Artists.